Federal 100: Emma Antunes

Antunes spearheaded the development of Spacebook, an internal Facebook-like application that enables scientists, engineers and others at NASA’s far-flung facilities to collaborate on projects.

Spacebook, considered a model for other government organizations that are looking for a secure approach to social networking, was developed in-house by NASA employees using open-source software. Antunes kept the project on track from start to finish, in terms of functionality and vision.

“If you don’t have someone making sure the purpose is met, then the project could wander all over the place and not get completed,” said Jim Wiedman, an enterprise architect at Stinger Ghaffarian Technologies who works full time at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. “Emma was the person on a day-to-day basis making sure that got done.”